I have a 62 Signet and the horns are not working.

Horn relay is ok.

I have power from starter solenoid to horn relay.

Horns work - ran a live wire to the horns from barrery and they blew.

Checked the horn switch; it seems to be ok.

Removed the steering wheel and checked the horn contact on the steering wheel which seems ok.

Used a multimeter to check for open circuit from steering shaft to ground - I only get a half swing to zero ohms.

I then temporarily put an earth wire from steering shaft to ground, but still no horn blow.

Any ideas on why horns won't work?

Thanks.[/i]

If I'm looking at the correct schematic for the 62 valiant:

You checked for 12v on the violet wire that runs to the relay to make sure you're getting voltage to the relay bus.

Assuming the 12v is present, the problem is after the relay, or the relay itself. Even if the inductive switch portion of the relay is working, it could still have an open on the switch path that brings 12v across the relay. Either that or the wiring to the positive side of the horn is shorting to ground somewhere.

If 12v is not present at the violet wire, you could have a fault on the hot side of the starter relay. But you said it was present, so it has to be that relay or the wiring between the horn.

I'd run a jumper between the relay 12v input (violet) and the horn positive terminal, to bypass the relay, and also reground the horn just for $#!+.

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What's this screw for?

'76 D100

Proceed very carefully -- your '62 has next to zero circuit protection, and it's very easy to have this kind of car-b-que (read down the post) happen.

By all means fix the horn (are you sure the horn relay's OK? It clicks, but when it's "on", do you have continuity between its in and out terminals?), but hurry and add a lot of circuit protection to the car sooner than later if you want to keep it.

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

I can't hear the "click" in the relay. Does it mean the relay is not working?

I don't have a good earth between the steering shaft and ground when I measure with the multimeter (I only get a half swing on the needle). Does this suggest a problem somewhere?

Thanks

How good is your hearing?

Seriously, if you're hearing's good enough to be able to hear a click from that relay (or you run a test lead from battery + to its trigger terminal and get no click with your ear next to it) then yeah, the relay's faulty.
The steering shaft isn't necessarily supposed to be grounded.

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

Thanks.

(I would have thought that the steering column would be grounded through the steering box).

How does the horn contact ring work? You press the horn ring, it contacts the ring under the steering wheel, etc., to close the circuit which should make the horns blow. Maybe I have a problem from the steering wheel back to the relay.

Horn switch completes ground path for horn relay coil (trigger).

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

I may be wrong, but if you observe 12v on the horn relay inductor wire (black) while your horn button is pressed, you're looking good. If you put your ear right on the relay, or even your finger, you should be able to feel/hear the switch throw when energized.

Let us know what you find.

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What's this screw for?

'76 D100

I had this happen once on my Duster... relay went click when horn button pressed and nothing out of the horn...grabbed a horn out of my parts stash hooked it up, and it honked.... never have seen a horn go south, but it must've gotten old and the windings opened up.... hope no one notices the 1967 horn under the battery tray...

In the motorcycle business horns go south fairly often. Most of the time all they need is an adjustment of the points which is done with the screw and locknut that can be found on the main body of the horn. Most horns I've seen have them and many horns can benefit from a 'tune up' adjustment of the screw.

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I was wondering bout the screw on my horn. I thought it was to "tune" the horn to a specific note.

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~Nic

Adjust it. You can probably get a few more decibels out of it.

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